Recently, a little ruckus arose when the thought-to-be private ICQ logs of an Internet company CEO were stolen and posted online for all to see. This was certainly an embarrassing occurrence, and it got me to wondering about what would happen if my ICQ logs were posted for public viewing. Then I took a look at me and Lowtax's ICQ history and realized that it's just a inane collection of back and forth nerd banter that no one with a moderately sane deposition would ever want to slog through, let alone study thoroughly and share with others. Want an example? Check out this "fascinating" totally authentic, unedited excerpt of thrilling instant messaging excitement!

Keep in mind that this is only an hour of conversation. Multiply this by three years and you'll get an idea of the horror my ICQ history contains.

Gore Sucks

I normally hate to write updates about games, since writing about games was my job for a long time and like most of you, no doubt, I'm pretty disgusted with the current state of the industry and nearly every crappy, un-fun game that's shoveled out onto the shelves. But variety is the spice of life, so go suck a nostril you ill-flavored schoolmarm!(from top to bottom) Gore allows you to shoot fat men who attack you with beer cans. Unfortunately, all the graphics in the game were done by the guy on our 404 Page. Al Gore is not pleased by any of this and wants another recount of something.

I don't know why, but today I downloaded and played the demo for 4D Rulers' upcoming FPS (First Person Shooter), Gore. I guess I kinda expected it to be moderately entertaining, partly because of its one syllable, vaguely ominous name. You know, following in the footsteps of Doom, Quake, Blood, Prey, and Sin. And since I'm a total moron, I got the name "4D Rulers" mixed up with "3D Realms" and thought Gore was made by the same people who made Duke Nukem and Shadow Warrior. Obviously I'm just kidding about that, since not even the most diehard brain-dead Counter-Strike player would ever confuse a glorified mod team pushing a crappy, four-year-late FPS with an established software developer who refuses to talk about their possibly amazing, four-year-late FPS starring Duke Nukem.

Surprise, surprise, after five minutes of mindless fragging and junky physics I was already bored out of my mind and completely underwhelmed. Yeah, I suppose being able to play as the "fat man" class and beat people to death with a beer can is a good idea, but tons of second-rate FPS's have nifty gimmicks like that. Things that are cool to do once or twice, but can't substitute for good old-fashioned gameplay, fun, uniqueness, and control. For example, in Powerslave you could push boxes around pusher/shover robot style, in Kingpin you could blow the limbs of dead bodies, in Redneck Rampage you could use your bowling ball weapon to actually bowl in an alley, and in Unreal you could experience multiplayer lag so powerful that it would rip open a time wormhole that made Milli Vanilli cool again and automatically downgraded your CPU to a 286 16MHZ.

So Gore will no doubt soon join the growing ranks of FPS yawn-fests, joining other forgettable failures like Terminal Terror, Chasm, Corridor 7, and Seed. Isn't it pathetic that I feel the need to show off my incredibly nerdy knowledge of videogames by listing all these relatively obscure titles nobody has heard of? God, I am such a hopeless geek. I really am ashamed of myself.

Anyways, I guess I have to attempt to inject some "humor" into this little diatribe, to excuse its existence, so here it goes: If Gore had stuck to its original premise, it would have probably become the greatest game of all time. What was its original premise, you ask? Why, it was a licensed game, of course! That's right, 4D Rulers secured the right to make a FPS starring then U.S. Vice President Al Gore! Players would blast through seventeen pulse-pounding levels as the Vice President, saving America from terrorist threats and covering up Bill Clinton's naughty indiscretions. However, 4D Rulers found it impossible to emulate Al Gore's movements in a FPS environment, since the V.P. is made of wood, cannot jump, and only travels at 1 MPH. Plus, he's vehemently anti-gun and wanted to make a game about saving forests instead!

See, it's funny because Gore shares the same name with a politician. And politicians are inherently hilarious. I learned this from master comedian Jay Leno, who ends every other joke with "Bill Clinton," or "Dan Quayle." Basically, all he does is go out on stage and say "You know who is stupid?!? George Bush!" and follow it up with a "A guy walks into a whorehouse… and it was Bill Clinton!" joke. And look at him, he brings home millions of dollars for his cleverness and all I bring home a sore hip due to Lowtax kicking me for singing along to Sonic 2 music in an off-key manner. So I might as well copy what works in a haphazard and amateurish manner, just like 4D Rulers!